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Your teeth can be the first place your body shows a deeper problem. When gums recede, enamel erodes, or bones quietly thin over time, it is easy to blame age and genetics and miss what might be driving the process underneath: chronic stress, rising acidity, and mineral depletion. We sit down with nutritionist Stephen Hewer to unpack his personal journey from mercury toxicity to decades of clinical work, and why he believes a specific form of calcium, “ionic calcium,” plays an outsized role in bone density, jaw health, nerve signaling, muscle function, and energy production.

We walk through the body’s constant fight to keep blood pH in a tight range and why Stephen argues that excess acids from metabolism, diet, and stress can push the body to “borrow” alkalinizing minerals from bone. He also explains the parathyroid hormone response when ionic calcium drops, and the downstream issues he associates with mineral imbalance, including osteoporosis, osteopenia, gum recession, and soft tissue calcification. Along the way, we discuss real-world stories, why fractures can be a silent turning point for older women, and how sleep, inflammation, and physiology interact with mental health in a way many people underestimate.

The conversation also widens into the human side: how disrespectful leadership and chronic pressure can amplify internal stress, and why dignity and equal treatment are not “soft” values but practical tools for resilience. We close with food quality, soil depletion, simple morning pH testing, and the nutrition strategies Stephen believes can support bone remineralization, including targeted supplementation and periods of juice fasting for a reset. If you find this helpful, subscribe, share this with someone worried about bone loss or dental health, and leave a review with your biggest takeaway.

Learn more at: https://getbonesofsteel.com/

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Help Moral Injury Support Network for Servicewomen, Inc. provide the support it needs to women veterans by donating to our cause at: https://misns.org/donation or send a check or money order to Moral Injury Support Network, 136 Sunset Drive, Robbins, NC 27325. Every amount helps and we are so grateful for your loving support. Thanks!

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A single prescription can change your life, but not always in the way you were promised. We sit down with Ellen P. Lubensky, Esquire, a Stanford graduate and attorney, to talk about what patients rarely hear clearly: the real-world risks of psychiatric medications, the gaps in informed consent, and how quickly benzodiazepine dependence can take hold when you’re just trying to sleep.

Ellen shares her personal and professional perspective after decades on psychiatric meds, including being physically disabled by a severe movement disorder linked to antipsychotics and later facing crushing insomnia and benzodiazepine withdrawal. We unpack what benzos are (Ativan, Xanax, Klonopin, Valium), why “may cause dependence” language is not enough when someone is in pain, and what questions you can ask a provider before starting, stopping, or tapering any medication. We also talk about misdiagnosis, identity getting fused to a label, and why two doctors can look at the same symptoms and recommend totally different paths.

We connect these issues to access problems that hit veterans especially hard, including limited formularies, therapy waitlists, and insurance barriers. Ellen also explains why 988 can be a practical support option for people in crisis, and she shares a realistic self-care toolkit: therapy, movement, meditation, peer support, and reaching out early on hard days.

If you care about patient autonomy, mental health parity, PTSD support, and safer prescribing, listen now. Subscribe, share this with someone who needs it, and leave a review with the question you wish every prescriber had to answer before handing over a script.

Visit our guest's website at: EllenLubensky.com

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Help Moral Injury Support Network for Servicewomen, Inc. provide the support it needs to women veterans by donating to our cause at: https://misns.org/donation or send a check or money order to Moral Injury Support Network, 136 Sunset Drive, Robbins, NC 27325. Every amount helps and we are so grateful for your loving support. Thanks!

Follow us on your favorite social channels: LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/moral-injury-support-network-for-servicewomen/

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Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/misnsconsult/

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A child doesn’t have the vocabulary for moral injury, PTSD, or hypervigilance, but they can feel a parent’s distance in their bones. When a service member or veteran comes home changed, kids often fill in the blank with the most painful explanation possible: “It must be my fault.” That’s where our conversation with licensed psychologist Dr. Pat Pernicano gets real, fast. She spent years at the South Texas VA working with veterans and co-developing Acceptance and Forgiveness Therapy, and she now focuses on how parental trauma ripples through children and family systems.

We talk attachment theory, deployment separation, and why “acting out” can be worry and grief in disguise. Dr. Pernicano explains how children internalize a caregiver’s emotional pain and how silence in the home can intensify shame and confusion. We also expand the lens beyond military families to first responders, medical providers, chaplains, and helpers carrying vicarious trauma, then bringing that stress back into everyday parenting.

At the center is her picture book, Little Butterfly And Her Daddy: Healing The Pain Of War, built to give families safe, age-appropriate language. A returning father whose wings don’t work becomes a powerful metaphor for a parent who can’t connect the way they used to, while a spider character “wraps up” worries so kids don’t carry them alone. We share ways the book can be used at home, in therapy, and in schools, plus discussion prompts that help kids open up without feeling pressured.

If you know a parent who’s struggling to talk, or a child who’s quietly carrying too much, listen, share this with someone who needs it, and subscribe and leave a review so more families can find these tools.

See all of her work at https://www.pernicanopathways.com

Support the show

Help Moral Injury Support Network for Servicewomen, Inc. provide the support it needs to women veterans by donating to our cause at: https://misns.org/donation or send a check or money order to Moral Injury Support Network, 136 Sunset Drive, Robbins, NC 27325. Every amount helps and we are so grateful for your loving support. Thanks!

Follow us on your favorite social channels: LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/moral-injury-support-network-for-servicewomen/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/dr.danielroberts

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/misnsconsult/